The New York Times is publishing its first e-book, executive editor Bill Keller’s Open Secrets: WikiLeaks, War and American Diplomacy: Complete and Updated Coverage from The New York Times (an essay adapted from the book's introduction will be published in this Sunday's Times magazine and is already available online). The book will be available on January 31, at all the major e-book retailers. Keller says "The publication of Open Secrets as an e-book is the latest example of the Times exploiting the creative potential of the Web to deliver the world's best journalism in whatever format readers find most appealing.” Keller will begin writing a regular column for the front of the Sunday magazine beginning in early March, at the behest of the publication’s new editor Hugo Lindgren.
At Inside Higher Ed, there’s an engaging conversation between Parul Sehgal, this year’s NBCC Nona Balakian award-winner, and Scott McLemee, a former Balakian honoree. Among Sehgal’s many sharp observations about book criticism is her discerning take on the field’s current landscape: “The shift from print to digital publishing used to provide me with some fine moments of terror. . . . [but] the more I quell my Chicken Little instincts, the more I allow myself to recognize—and enjoy—this moment of incredible intellectual abundance. And in terms of whether the ‘old regime’ still matters, in criticism, we're always standing on the shoulders of giants.”
There’s yet another thing that Vladimir Nabokov was right about: Polyommatus blues. Nabokov, an ardent lepidopterist, floated a speculative hypothesis about butterfly evolution in 1945, which was just proven correct by recent DNA research.
Tonight in Soho, McNally Jackson books hosts a discussion between editor Christopher Glazek and author Ida Hattemer-Higgins about her debut novel, The History of History.
